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The Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi. File | Photo Credit: ANI

The Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, on Friday (May 29, 2026) questioned how Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), one of India’s largest IT services companies, lost the Central Board of Secondary Education’s (CBSE) on-screen marking (OSM) contract to COEMPT Edutek, alleging that tender norms were diluted to favour the latter.

He also questioned Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s silence on the OSM controversy.

“...Modi ji, your silence on the CBSE debacle and inaction against the Education Minister tells the country what you actually care about — not the futures of lakhs of students, only the survival of your own government,” Mr. Gandhi said in a post on X.

Sharing a media report, Mr. Gandhi claimed that CBSE had called for OSM tenders three times before awarding the contract to COEMPT. According to him, there were no bids in the first round and no qualified bidder in the second, following which technical requirements were progressively relaxed.

Mr Gandhi alleged that the scanning resolution requirement was reduced, the condition for robotic scanners removed, and the Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) certification requirement lowered from Level 5 to Level 3. He further claimed that penalties for errors in answer-sheet scanning were also dropped.

“TCS, India’s biggest IT services company, qualified in the third round too. TCS lost. COEMPT — a company with a spectacular track record of failure — won,” he said.

Linking the tender process to complaints regarding the evaluation glitches, Mr. Gandhi said students had reported “badly scanned answer sheets, missing pages” and problems with the evaluation portal.

He also claimed that teachers had warned CBSE that the OSM system required one to two more years of preparation before nationwide implementation.

Questioning the government’s explanation that “due process was followed”, Mr. Gandhi said the issue was whether the contract had been “honestly awarded to the best company”.

“The futures of 18.5 lakh children were handed to a company that could only qualify after the rules were bent for it,” he said.

The Opposition leader also responded to several Union Ministers, who claimed that Congress governments in Karnataka and Telangana used the services of COEMPT.

“To the BJP Ministers attacking me for asking questions—I have, from day one, demanded an independent judicial probe. Expand it from CBSE to every contract awarded to COEMPT. Our youth deserve the truth,”Mr. Gandhi said.

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